Heteropatriarchy

The dominant systems of heteronormativity and patriarchy which support one another to devalue and subordinate femininity to masculinity, constructing the feminine as weak, irrational, in need of leadership, and ultimately a void that needs to be filled by the presence of the masculine. Heteropatriarchy functions as a tool used to maintain the settler colonial state which requires the normalized subordination of one group to another. Functionally, heteropatriarchy is a set of cultural scripts (sexual, vocational, behavioral, emotional, aesthetic, and so on) which serve to define both masculinity and femininity in narrow and limiting ways in order to maintain a sharp binary distinction between male and female, dominant and subordinate.

———."Heteropatriarchy and the Three Pillars of White Supremacy." CPT Training Resources. Cherokee intellectual, feminist, anti-violence activist, theologian, Andrea Smith, takes a look at intersectionality, and at three basic myths that work to establish white male supremacy. Genocide/Colonialism; Slavery/Capitalism; Orientalism/War. This short article is an excellent, short, dense, and powerful framing of the multiple intersecting myth/lies that maintain power.